Now I Know My ABC's
by CryOnMyShoulder
Summary: The ER staff is sent back to repeat every school grade, starting with Kindergarten. Let the antics begin!


~*Now I Know My ABC's- Part 1*~   
By Kelly  
  
Disclaimer: I don't own them, if I did, do you really think something like this would happen?  
  
Feedback is always appreciated. DougandCarol@hotmail.com   
  
You need to know: This is set during season 8, but I've made some changes. Luka and Abby never broke up, they're still together. Dave was caught "rocking the ambulance" but wasn't fired. Deb never quit, and yeah, Carter and Susan are together.  
  
I'd suggest seeing, or at least knowing the plot behind the movie "Billy Madison" before reading this. It's based very lightly on that. He was sent back to repeat each grade K thru 12, and had two weeks to repeat each one. It's changed in my story, they each have one week.  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
  
"You are all being sent back to school to repeat every grade, kindergarten through 12th." Romano ordered, staring at the group of faces that surrounded the meeting table.   
  
That one statement sent the whole room into a fit of shouts and angry replies as they reacted to the announcement. Confused glances and angry stares were all shot at Romano who stood at the head of the table, his gold stethoscope hanging from his neck.  
  
"You're out of your mind Romano." Peter growled, getting to his feet. "If you think I'm going back to school…"  
  
"Ah, ah Peter." Romano replied in a sly voice. "You heard me, kindergarten through 12th grade."  
  
"He can't be serious." Abby whispered to Chuny who stood next to her near the doorway.  
  
"I'm dead serious Ms. Lockhart." He shot back, moving around the table slowly. "Starting tomorrow morning, every one of you puny ER doctors and nurses will report to Lakeshore Elementary School where you will spend a week making up each grade."  
  
"And who's going to work the ER while we're off finger painting and learning to add?" Mark asked, pulling his glasses from his face and rubbing his eyes.  
  
"I've called in a temp staff." He replied. "After the incidents that have taken place around here over the past year I'm sure they'll do a much better job than any of you idiots. And if they don't, they go back to school as well."  
  
"What if we refuse to go? What if we don't go at all?" Elizabeth asked, clearly ticked off about the entire experience.   
  
"Then you're fired." He replied. "No school, no job. It's as simple as that." Romano replied with a grin. "Between the gun wars, explosions, medication screw ups, and unplanned pregnancies you've all been responsible for in the past year, I think you all need a lesson. So grab your calculators and chemistry books, because for the next thirteen weeks you will all be back at school."  
  
"You expect us all to go back to school? Where are they going to put us?" Carter asked, rolling his eyes at Susan who stifled back a laugh.   
  
"Don't roll your eyes at me Dr. Carter. And Dr. Lewis, I'm glad you find him so amusing, maybe scrubbing the locker room floors will change your mind about just how funny he is."  
  
"Sorry." She replied with a straight face.   
  
"I've made all the arrangements with the schools. So you'll have no worry about that Dr. Carter."  
  
"Are there any of us who don't have to go?" Deb asked from her seat next to Cleo.   
  
Romano laughed and shook his head, grabbing a list from the table in front of him. "Why, should you get preferential treatment?" he asked, staring at her. "I'll read off my list, if you're on it you will go." He ordered, staring out at the faces again. "Dr. Weaver, Dr. Greene, Dr. Corday, Dr. Benton, Dr. Chen, Dr. Malucci, Dr. Lewis, Dr. Carter, Dr. Finch, Dr. Kovac, Nurse Lockhart, Nurse Marquez, and Nurse McGrath."   
  
"You're telling me that we will all be in a class with the other children?" Luka asked, looking up from the patch of floor he was looking at.  
  
"Yup. There will be no special treatment either. When they're told to build a castle with blocks, you will all build castles with blocks. When they have to go to gym class and run a mile, you will all have to do the same. When they have to go to History class and learn about Henry Clay, so will you." He finished, with a satisfied grin. "Maybe this will teach all of you incompetent physicians a lesson."  
  
"Robert." Elizabeth began, growing angrier.  
  
"No buts Lizzie. Now all of you get out of here now before I make you spend two weeks in every grade."  
  
Staring silently at him for another moment, they finally began getting up from their seats and filing out into the hallway. Once they had, everyone broke into a hysterical rage of angry words and comments.   
  
"I can't believe he's doing this." Cleo said to Peter, who just shook his head and clenched his fist.   
  
"He's out of his damn mind." He replied, slamming the elevator button. "What am I going to do with Reese while I'm at school?"  
  
"I don't see what kind of lesson this will teach us." Luka sighed as he and Abby climbed down the stairs to the lower level.   
  
"It won't teach us anything, he's doing it to entertain himself." She replied, sipping from her coffee cup. "I hated school." She sighed, tapping her fingers along the handrail and they turned to the next flight of stairs.  
  
"Maybe it won't be so bad?" he suggested, shrugging his shoulders.  
  
Letting out a short laugh of amusement, she just shook her head and clutched the coffee cup in her hands. "You didn't fail math."  
  
"What are we going to do about money?" Elizabeth asked, slamming the door of the refrigerator in the lounge. "We have a mortgage and car payments and bills." She recited, pouring milk into her coffee. "He is such a prick."  
  
"He better be paying us for this thing." Mark replied, opening his locker. "We need to pay the nanny too."  
  
"I'm going to shove my stethoscope up his ass." Elizabeth mumbled, crossing her arms.  
  
"Why's everyone pissed about this?" Dave asked, approaching the admit desk with Chuny and Malik. "Don't you guys remember kindergarten? I mean, playing with toys, snack time, nap time." He continued, emphasizing the word nap. "It's like a mini person's heaven."  
  
"Yeah man, and don't you remember high school?" Malik reminded him, grabbing a chart. "This is whack."  
  
"Hey, why doesn't Haleh or Randi have to go? They work in the ER." Chuny asked, staring at the desk clerk who smirked as she fiddled with the computer.  
  
"You wish." Randi replied, turning to her. "Me, back in elementary school? In your dreams."  
  
"Man, this sucks." Carter whined, stepping up to admit. "It sucks."  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
The next morning came all too quickly it seemed, and brought with it cold air and light snow. Standing outside the school, Abby, Luka, Chuny and Susan huddled together in a small group as Peter, Cleo, Malik, Kerry and Mark huddled together in another not far from the other. Every so often, one would turn to look at the school building, then quickly turn back as they waited for the "escort" Romano had promised would meet them outside.  
  
"Where are Elizabeth, and Malucci?" Cleo asked, pulling her jacket tighter around her body as she bounced up and down in an attempt to stay warm.  
  
"She's coming, Ella was fussy this morning." Mark replied, turning toward the building. "I still can't believe Romano's making us do this."  
  
"Romano's an ass." Peter muttered, tugging on his jacket. "I was suppose to be off tomorrow, now I had to get Jackie to watch Reese for me."  
  
"Where is everyone else?" Abby ask, peering over her shoulder toward the street where a line of bright yellow school buses were lined, full of children bouncing around inside. Arms were hanging out of windows, hats were being tossed around inside, heads were bobbing up and down as the children bounced and jumped on seats.   
  
"They better get here soon, it's almost eight." Luka replied, sipping from his coffee cup.   
  
"I'll bet all of you twenty that Dave doesn't show." Chuny bet, laughing along with Susan. "Where's Carter?"  
  
"I don't know. He drove me here and then disappeared." Susan shrugged.   
  
"Think that no smoking on school grounds applies to us?" Abby asked, fiddling with the pack of cigarettes in her coat pocket.   
  
Susan laughed as she sipped from her own coffee. "I think everything applies to us."  
  
Suddenly one of the doors of the school swung open and a heavyset woman appeared, carrying with her a clipboard and a whistle. Climbing down the short flight of stairs, she took her place next to the two groups of adults and motioned to them that she'd be with them in a minute. Then, taking the whistle in her mouth, she allowed it to let out a shrill, and suddenly twenty yellow buses opened their doors, and children came pouring out.  
  
"Watch out." Cleo warned, as the herd of children came running toward them.  
  
"There they are." Mark announced as he was swatted by a small boy, running toward the building with a baseball bat and schoolbag. Pointing toward the sidewalk, the remainder of the ER staff was gathered, watching as the kids made their way into the school building.  
  
"We're all going to die." Malik sighed, watching the last of the kids run into the school building.  
  
"Romano will pay when we get back." Kerry replied, approaching the heavyset woman.  
  
"I'm guessing this is all of you?" she asked, staring into the three groups, which were now one. "I'm Karen Cardillo, the principal of Lakeshore Elementary."  
  
Staring back at her, the ER staff merely shook their heads and waited for her to continue.  
  
"I'm sure Dr. Romano informed you of what will be happening, but I'll refresh your memories. For the next thirteen weeks, you will all be assigned to a classroom where you will have one week to again complete that grade. Today, you all begin in kindergarten. You will be required and expected to follow all orders given to you by the teacher and complete all assignments given to you. If you don't meet that requirement, all of your co-workers will move to the next grade level, and you will remain in the level you are at for an additional week, or however many weeks it takes you to complete the requirement."  
  
"You mean, we could be here for longer than thirteen weeks?" Dave asked, looking skeptical.  
  
"That's right.." she replied, looking for his name.  
  
"Dr. Dave." He replied.  
  
"Dave." She mumbled, looking through the clipboard. "Alright, lets go inside to the lobby where we'll get you all your name tags and then we'll get you down to the kindergarten class."  
  
"Name tags?" Carter replied, rolling his eyes. "How fun."  
  
Stepping into the school building, they were suddenly surrounded by murals of color painted all over the walls. A winter wonderland display sat in a showcase near the main office, along with various pieces of artwork obviously done by the children at the school.  
  
"Ok, when I call your name, take the name tag, put it on your shirt and stand over there." Mrs. Cardillo announced, reading from the list. "Kerry, Malik, Abby, Cleo.." she called, slowly handing out the tags one by one.  
  
"This is ridiculous." Luka sighed, staring down at the bright yellow star that was taped to his shirt, his name written across it in black marker.  
  
"At least you got a star." Abby mumbled, looking down at the green frog nametag taped to her shirt.   
  
"I want the frog!" Dave cried, looking down at his clown.   
  
"You should know Dave's afraid of clowns." Carter whispered to the principal, loud enough for Dave to hear.  
  
"I'm not afraid of clowns." He replied defensively, looking at the nametag as though it was alive and going to eat him.  
  
"Enough!" the principal replied, handing out the last of the tags. "You were sent back here to learn with the children, not act like them."  
  
"Obviously you don't know Dr. Malucci." Cleo mumbled under her breath.  
  
"I heard that." Dave replied.  
  
Sighing loudly, the principal gathered the group and waved for them to follow her down a long hallway. Passing by classrooms, many with their doors opened, she finally reached a door at the end of the hallway and knocked on it. Waiting for it to be opened, she took one last look at the group of ER doctors and nurses and sighed.   
  
"Mrs. Jensen, your students have arrived." She announced, as a middle-aged woman with black hair opened the door. "They are all yours." She finished, hurrying away quickly.  
  
"Come in, come in." Mrs. Jensen said warmly, waving them through the doors into the brightly decorated classroom.   
  
Inside, the ER staff looked around at the six small tables that sat in various places in the room, each with five children seated at them. Then they spotted the four empty tables set amongst them and eyed them curiously. Set all around the room were lots of toys, and along one wall sat a line of cubbies that held jackets, lunchboxes and messily finished art projects. An art corner sat near the fire exit, and a large green carpet was near the cubbies, along with a pile of blankets set nearby.  
  
"Welcome to the kindergarten room." The teacher said, as she shut the door behind them. "These are your classmates."  
  
"This lady's nuts." Dave whispered to Abby, who only stood still, fumbling again with the pack of cigarettes in her pocket,  
  
"Class, I want you to all stand up and introduce yourselves to the new members of our class for this week." She continued, standing in front of everyone. "Natalie, you can start."  
  
"Natalie."  
  
"Joey."  
  
"I'm Samantha."  
  
"Crissy."  
  
"Pamela."  
  
"Danny."  
  
"Sam."  
  
"Noelle."  
  
"Evan."  
  
"Evan smells." One of the kids called from a nearby table.  
  
"No I don't!" Evan replied with a pout and a stomp of his foot.   
  
"Yes you do!"  
  
"Enough both of you." The teacher ordered, waving her hand. "Evan take your seat."  
  
As he sat back down, the rest of the class continued to introduce themselves until they got to the final girl. Once they had, Mrs. Jensen turned to the ER staff and waved her hand.   
  
"Now you." She ordered.  
  
"What a waste of time." Peter mumbled. "I'm going to kill Romano."  
  
"We're all going to kill Romano." Elizabeth mumbled back, pulling on her nametag. "What in bloody hell is this going to teach us?"  
  
"Lets start with you." The teacher said sweetly, looking to Chuny.   
  
"Chuny."  
  
"Luka."  
  
"You talk funny!" one of the children called, pointing at Luka. "You talk like you don't have a nose!"  
  
"Billy, stop that." The teacher ordered, pointing to him. "You apologize to Luka right now."  
  
"Sorry." He replied.  
  
"Good. Now please continue." She finished, pointing at Abby.  
  
"Abby."  
  
"Carter."  
  
"Susan."  
  
"Kerry."  
  
"Mark."  
  
"Jing-Mei."  
  
"What!?" a few of the children called out, wrinkling their noses.  
  
"Deb." She sighed, looking to the floor as she rolled her eyes.  
  
"Elizabeth."  
  
"Malik."  
  
"Peter."  
  
"Dave."  
  
"Cleo."  
  
"Ok, good. Now, why don't you all take your seats over there." She directed, pointing to the empty tables that were arranged near each other. "Once you're all settled, we'll begin our assignments for the day."  
  
Stepping over unhappily to the tables, the adults looked down at the chairs and sat down, their knees practically touching their chests.   
  
"I'm going to get a damn leg cramp." Malik sighed, adjusting himself on the seat next to Elizabeth.   
  
"I'm never going to be able to get up again." Mark added, pulling his chair away from the table.   
  
"Ok class!" the teacher called, clapping her hands. "Yesterday, do you remember the letter we worked on?"  
  
"H!" the class promptly responded, getting an eye roll from Abby.  
  
"I need to go to the bathroom." Susan mumbled to Carter who was next to her.  
  
"So do I." He whispered back, as the teacher began passing out paper.  
  
"Why are they here? Are they stupid?" a girl asked, pointing at the ER staff.   
  
"We're not stupid!" Dave shouted back, growing angry.  
  
"David, that is no way to talk with your new classmates." Mrs. Jensen said, handing out crayons.   
  
"They're munchkins." He replied, playing with his nametag.   
  
"I am not a munchkin!" Natalie called back.  
  
"Yes you are!"  
  
"No I'm not!"  
  
"Yes you are!"  
  
"No I'm not!"  
  
"Enough!" Mrs. Jensen shouted, as the ER staff sat dully, watching the children grow riled up.  
  
Suddenly, a stuffed doll flew across the room, hitting Mrs. Jensen in the head before falling to the floor at her feet. Staring at the room filled with children and adults, she crossed her arms and turned in the direction the doll flew from.   
  
"Who threw that?" she asked angrily, picking it up from the floor.   
  
Nobody dared to speak; they all looked from face to face and sat silent.  
  
"If you don't tell me who threw that doll you will all get a time out." She continued. "Who threw it?"  
  
"Carter did it!" Molly called, pointing at him.  
  
"Carter did it, Carter did it!" the class began shouting as Mrs. Jensen turned toward Carter who sat at his table with an emotionless look on his face.   
  
"That's it. I can already see who the troublemakers are going to be. Carter, you go to the time out chair for 15 minutes!"  
  
"The time out chair?" he replied, looking amused as some of the ER staff attempted to hide their smirks.  
  
"Yes, the time out chair. Now!"  
  
Standing up, Carter threw up his hands and walked to the corner where a small chair sat, facing the wall. Getting down into it, he set his hands on his knees and waited. Only a few minutes passed before he went to move, and the chair tipped back, bringing him to the floor with it.  
  
"Carter's a dummy!" one of the children called.  
  
"Kindergarten sucks." Abby mumbled.  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
  
Stay tuned; it will get better. I promise.  
  
12/12/01 


End file.
